will be speaking and sharing what tech sf means to them. first we will have julie who is a veteran and student right now and currently an intern at wikipedia if i am not mistaken so julie come on up here. [applause] >> hi. thanks for having me. i am really nervous. anyway tech sf -- wow, i see this project as a answer to our prayers because i share the worries of a lot of students regarding internships and permanent employment opportunities, so thank you for this program. the office of economic and work force development and mayor and dr. momordi and the computer

head of engineering at sf state. well i guess i am here today to tell you a story -- well, i will tell you one about opportunities . with blessing and disguise i see opportunities in different forms. several years ago i hit a roadblock in my life and i saw the military as an opportunity to change my life and change the life of others, so i signed up to be a soldier in the army, and i did this quick fast and in a hurry so i don't have time to change my mind. it's a nerve wracking experience, but one that do i not regretd, so when i signed up i was shipped out in three weeks. i was presented with a lot of job offers from being a 42 alpha or paper pusher, i

guess -- that's what we call it. combat camera and a medic which is a job that will give you $40,000 signing bonus. hefty but i didn't take it. instead i took a job at a broadcast technician and thought that will give me a lot of future bonuses than any quick cash can give me, so as a 25 romero i thought i think my father's prediction was right 20 years ago. he told me that the it industry will grow exponentially and he was right, so i took the job, and kept my

eyes closed, and after getting shipped out i received a lot of letters from family and friends saying, wishing me luck because they thought it wasn't a very bright idea for me to take that opportunity to change my life. i proved them wrong, but when i got hurt -- during active duty that made them think for a minute they were right, but that roadblock didn't stop me and i saw that as another opportunity to learn. with the gi bill i am going to school and continue my career in the engineering field. i currently go to san francisco state as a computer engineering student and there i am able to learn more about my field, my

field of interest, and i think this will provide me with those opportunities that i was talking about, especially being in the bay area where it's like the it capital of the world, so what better place to be than san francisco; right? i didn't do this quick, fast, and in a hurry. i actually thought about this one, so after much research i saw this program, and sf state and the city as what ron would say "a match made in heaven" because computer engineering is what i call a hybrid between electrical engineering and computer science because it world has many different sectors and you want to be versatile.

you don't want to -- well, some of us would prefer to be experts in one field. for example programming or making robots, but i think being versed in both sides of the spectrum tells you tremendously understanding programming, electronics, signal processing, networking, chip design -- i could go on and on, and i think this will give us more opportunities in the area rather than being skilled in one thing. now i'm a senior and i am graduating in the spring, fingers crossed and i couldn't have made a better choice. i think computer engineering was

the best choice for me. like i said opportunities are not always readily available. we all get nervous about that. sometimes we need to take charge and take those opportunities so last summer i decided to take it a step further and i applied for probably about 200 different interning opportunities that i saw available on craigslist and on company websites, on government websites and i got lucky a few of them called back out of about -- maybe about 5% of them, but i put my faith into the hands of these companies. it was out of my hands once i click the "submit" button, but i was lucky to come across a nonprofit organization that put their faith in me, so now i work

as an it intern where people share the sum of all knowledge, where knowledge is free, wikipedia. that's their promotional line; right. so last week i asked my boss why he hired me when i got invited to be part of this program, so he said to me "well, there were a lot of other students. many from impressive private schools -- i wouldn't name them, but they were very, very impressive with proficiencies in programming c or engineering and there -- they were academically inclined but they chose little old me, and this is what he said to me. he said he hired me because i was the only one that said i was there to learn". i

had more questions for them than they had for me, so it was pretty much their interview, so as much as i work now i feel like i take away far more than i am able to contribute with the amount of knowledge that i gain everyday. i think that's a bonus. and in the it world our building blocks -- you all know this. our language is made up of two bits; right? a zero and a one. so off and on. we have to be a zero in order to be a one, so i see a life as binary because when we stop learning we stop living so always take the opportunity to learn. thank you. [applause] >> thank you julie. up next we

will have jose who is a student at bay cap. [applause] >> hi eryone. fit oall thanks for having me. i'm actually used to be the guy behind the camera, not in front of it, so bewith me. mayor lee, distinguished guest of ad, sf city, sf partners it's a real honor to be here to speak to you today and my work experience and path. i was originally born in elvaldoor and my mom brought me here at ten. after graduating high school i wasn't sure what career path to take even though i really like media and technology i didn't know there was a career path for it. everybody kept on telling me you should be a doctor, a

lawyer because that's where the money is. the usual thing that parents say. it seemed to me you really have to be very lucky and hard working like a steven speilburg or end up video taping weddings which i have done and there is nothing wrong with. so in community college i finally decided to take a video production course which lead me to pursue a degree in broadcasting and i just dove in. my first semester at san francisco state i realized i would need some real world experience, and so i applied and was accepted into the internship at bay cat and i never left so i am still there. i learned so much there, not just the technical skills, but also soft skills needed to get hired in any work place. i love the work so much so i chose to stay on and i'm going to be a volunteer

just to be able to learn the advance production skills and help the next generation of interns, so after graduating from college at sf state they offered me a job. they were employed me and have a real career in media and technology and actually make a living doing what i love. three years later i have been able to accomplish a lot more and continue to produce great videos, improve my skills, i continue to improve my skills but more importantly i am able to mentor the next set of interns and providing the support and training i received and i am able to give back in a way that feels good, and i think ultimately now i'm able to hire them for studio media work, so a typical day for me -- i'm the production manager at bay cat

is going to pacific heights and for filming and award video and then back to the office, work with a program team to assign the next sf tech internship and mentoring bernie king who is here in the audience with us. he's one of the graduate interns and mentor him in his production company start up. all the cities and the program's investment in tech sf for continuing to provide pathways for people like me for us and show us connections between our passion for media and technology and turn that passion not just into a job but a career so thank you very much. [applause] >> and rhonda simmons director of the office of workforce development position and then we will following this we will

close. [applause] >> wow it's been a long time coming for this. so started about two years ago with the grant process and i want to thank again mayor lee for the support and submitting the proposal. like he said we have roughly $8 million to do this over the four year period of time. you can seat students before us. the goal is placement ultimately and make sure they're placed in the field of technology. if you have been in this cycle and you have done work for us you know it's all based on the labor market and we're in a boone in this town and one of the reasons we were able to secure the grant is san francisco and the technology companies really buying into this as mayor lee said and we teed up the right partnership and this is one of the sector

strategies under mayor lee. we have construction and health care and we started hospitality and whatever else he says i need to do, so this is one of many to ensure that san franciscans across the board are employed in all of the industries that we have in this state city. with that i would like to city a little more about the labor market and how we set up this training. it's all driven by the labor market. we pay close attention to what the employers need. we try to flex in what they want with training and skills as andrew mentioned and ron mentioned. it's all based on what the employers need in terms of skills so we hope we put something together that is adaptable and flexible for the market and much of the employment is driven around the technology center so we want to adapt and make sure our clients

are employed. we focused on mobile apaps. i am considered an elder in the technology field. most of the folks coming into this are much more creative. the whole innovation model that supports mayor lee's efforts. it's being able to adapt to the change of technology. all of our supporters and know this and between the mobile apapps industry and you will hear more from james jones and talk about communication technology and everybody in the room has a hand held computer and think about ten years ago we didn't have that so the change in technology is important. you can see what we're focused on in the 35 growing occupations in san francisco. all of that is incorporated into our curriculum and make it adaptable. the

partnership with sf tech and city college is there and you heard about jaun going back to school and we are emphasizing placement we want all the folks have the tools that they need including degrees and the advanced credentials to be successful in this industry. tech sf we're trying to align with the industry trends as you see on the board. the young lady talked about computer engineer. there is system analysis. there is graphic design which is a rich industry in this city as it relates to technology, so our goal is to make sure when you grate from tech sf, whatever door you come in you have everything that you need to be successful, an internship, a placement, whatever your goals are to get back into school. that's our commitment to you. i know you heard strong commitment with

mayor lee and sf city and ron and i want to say it's taken a long time to get here but we're here and go giants. yeah i think we're going to wrap up so there can be q and a while we still have some of the mayor's valuable time and i want to thank everybody for coming and thank everybody that participated in putting this on. >> that concludes our program. thank you so much

>> san francisco mayor lee is here to join us. this is especially special for us. about 14 months ago when we kicked off our first program lee was here. he helped cut the ribbon and launch with our first companies about 14 months ago, and i one thing i will say before you get up we thought long and hard where we wanted green star located and we knew we wanted it in silicon valley and we wanted to know where they were going to and we believe san francisco is on the way to being the heart and hub of silicon valley and

where the heart and the leadership is and we will exciting where it's going and please welcome mayor ed lee. >> thank you mitch. thank you so much. you know innovation is infectious. it's as infectious as giants fever. how about that? so let me tell you i have been excited ever since i came here and cut the ribbon with mitch a year ago and want to the get back here and see how everything was progressing and guess what? just over a year and a half ago when we first started here and when i started as mayor san francisco unemployment rate was 9.6% and last week six-point 9%. what a flip and a lot of it has to do with all the job creation you're doing right here and i want to congratulate you green start and all the companies starting out

here. i like to be next and involved with all of the innovation going on. that is really infectious and i really like that with this city. because there are 208 clean tech companies in san francisco and there are 83 investors and i think they're all here today. i think we earned the title of north american clean tech group and part of my administration that we support you and we engage with in how to do it better and you're part of my 17 points of job growth in the city. i ran on that as the new mayor in town. by the way i never have ran for public office before so you need to help me look good. i know they're going to work and as mitch said we are the ecosystem. this is how things are happening. this is

why people are coming into san francisco. in addition we have a tourist sector going on, life sciences going on. everybody is innovating in the right places and doing it here in san francisco and there is a strong spirit and we will continue growth and jobs everybody. we want to help everybody out and support each other and that comes to what we do here in san francisco. today i am announcing a new initiative and clean tech sf initiative which we launching with all of you. there are three part it is of this. the first part is we're working with the california clean energy fund. i know jeff anderson is here today as part of them and he's going to be partners with us, and he's partners in every branch that we doing. the first thing we're doing as clean tech sf we will

establish innovation zones in san francisco. what does that mean? we asked last time when we were here in san francisco and how can we help? perhaps we can help with the resources that the city doesn't use to the highest use. let's take our space. we have a lot of assets under utilized. how can we allow the demonstrations that you're having today have a real field test for what they are, and if we could allow ourselves to be very flexible with our leases, our spaces we will allow ourselves to do that with partnership with green start and incubate some of the demonstrationos our property, let's take what we're doing specifically. with our sfpuc, with the department of the environment and melanie is here today and doing a great job with our mos connie center and i know we have a lot of panels up

there already but doesn't fill all the roof tops and there is new technology coming out all the time. we have been challenged in the solar technology arena because traditional technology has heavy weight technology that always challenged the integrity of roof tops, and moscone is the one we found and let that be for one of these companies and light ultralight technology and use, cheaper way of getting solar out there and we're going to allow them to demonstrate their product on top of our mos connie roof and that is an example we're doing in utilizing all of the agency's cooperations and make sure the start ups can use real testing sites in the city. that is thanks to the hardand

kelly and the manager at puc and barbara hale and the second thing we're going to do is take a page out of what we're doing with clean tech and biotech life sciences. you see what mission bay is doing. they have for the last ten years building up a ecosystem of pharmaceutical companies and san francisco medical center and integrated around with the research teams to form a very strong research center and because of that center more and more companies around the world are locating there because they want to be next to the laboratory innovators. they're sharing laboratories, sharing scientists and collaborating and all with solutions about the future of medicine. taking a page out of that why couldn't we do the same thing with clean tech? we want

to invite institutions like our california puc, our san francisco puc, our department of the environment, organizations and private institutions like sun run or pg&e to potentially create the network of their innovative sites and their innovative divisions to work together and potentially in a physical location or just begin networking first, and start working with the major universities and their research entities on their sites so we can start anchoring these institutions within san francisco and create another ecosystem of anchoring institutions. that proved successful in the delivery of pharmaceutical answers to medical challenges. i think it will prove to be helpful here to have them focial exciting center to come and look at and draw the attention i think of even more

start ups, and the third part of this clean sf initiative is make sure that we do everything possible to support clean tech start ups. we can do that with partnership with the clean energy fund and our departments and their funds for grants and help green start with all of these start ups and make sure they know we're supporting them in every way possible, and through that partnership we will come up with even more ideas. this continues to be the innovation capital in the world and i will put that in context and melanie asked me to remind all of you. there is no other city in the united states if not the world that can say they accomplished goals of 80% of all of our garage is being repsyched in san francisco. we will get to 100% in our lifetimes and this i grant you because we have innovators here and people

committed. we have investors here to help us with the new ideas. this last 20% of recycling is going to be the hardest but the most enjoyable. this city will continue to innovate. we will embrace clean technologies. we we will certificate green start and demonstrations that we will see today and october is innovation month and gratifying for those and happy clean tech day in san francisco. thank you very much. [applause] >> it is awesome to have the mayor announce that right here at green start. we are thrilled to be a part of that. it's true a year ago mayor lee asked "what can we do to help?" and we said we have lots of companies that

want to test pilot things and deploy things and how can san francisco be a part of that and to see this come together so quickly is incredibly rewarding and testament to the leadership you're providing and san francisco is lucky to have you francisco is lucky to have you as our mayor. thank you [horns honking] announcer: big dreams and good grades aren't enough to get into college. there are actual steps you need to take. finding someone who can help is the first and most important. for the next steps, go to knowhow2go.org.